Wildlife property tax reduction
A bill that recently passed the NC General Assembly will change the property tax classification for certain land that benefits wildlife.
The new tax classification for wildlife conservation land can reduce the pressure to sell land caused by increasing property taxes. The bill, HB 1889, introduced by Rep. Pricey Harrison of Greensboro, would help protect some landowners from increased taxes. These tax increases are caused by higher potential value of land that could be developed. An existing law protects land that is actively farmed.
However, the bill was amended in the Senate to apply only to 20-acre or larger properties, rather than the 10-acre minimum the House passed. There is a 10-acre minimum in existing law for farmland.
I hope the General Assembly will reduce the minimum size for wildlife land. The minimum for farmland and wildlife land should be set to five acres.
John Shaw
Cary
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Land preservation
My father-in-law recently worked through a six year process of getting his 200-acre farm placed into conservation to protect it from development after he dies. Six years! The real estate lobby fights tooth and nail to make it difficult for land owners to opt out of their sprawl and greed mentality. He had to spend thousands on legal advice to get an ironclad prohibition against developers who wanted to destroy his beautiful land by building McMansions on every square inch of the property.
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Jesus Swept, coming in December